telephone line dead

[smf4122]

2am my burglar alarm starts bleeping. If it had been activated, it would have gone off waking the whole neighbourhood. Turns out yet again the phone line is dead. I check the service and it says not connected, then the modem goes RED and eventually after I restart the box twice I get a phone line back. The alarm though I cannot reset at 2 in the morning so if I was alone and had activated the alarm, it would then be rendered useless by Virgin disconnecting the signal. This has now happened many times since Virgin decided to move the phone line to the digital line dependent on the router and then keep disconnecting the service to the router in the middle of the night. The analogue phone lines are not set to be disconnected for another three years so should they have forced us to switch if they clearly haven't sorted all the bugs yet? Also we then tried to speak to someone on the phone this morning only to get a lady in the Philippines talking so fast we cd barely understand her and then saying her systems were down so she cdn't check our service now...when we wanted to talk to someone about what happened at 2 this morning not now. I am feeling very frustrated with the alarm constantly being screwed up and getting woken at 1.30 or 2 in the morning by this problem. What are Virgin going to do about this? 

[smf4122]

I would also like to add I have major health issues and having to go downstairs in the middle of the night and then not being able to get back to sleep for several hours has severely affected my health today. It should not happen. 

[goslow · Accepted solution]

Is it only at night that the problems occur (when VM may be doing routine maintenance tasks involving restarting the hub etc.) or other times of the day too (suggesting you may have some kind of phone fault on your line)?

The limitations of connecting equipment (other than a telephone) to the 21CV phone line from the hub get regular mentions on the forums. Getting a modification/add-on to your alarm panel so that it works via a mobile signal, rather than the VM landline, might be substantive fix for the issue rather than trying to involve VM (who are unlikely to be interested/useful unless there is an actual fault on your line).

[smf4122]

yes it does happen I think only in the middle of the night and I appreciate that it may be down to regular maintenance but I don't see why I should have to pay for a modification to my burglar alarm when it's VM's fault. Surely if VM thought it was such a good idea to make this change way before it was necessary, by now they should have come up with some way of dealing with this problem. Presumably there are plenty of ppl with support alarms who are faced with the same issues and who are a great deal less technically capable than I am. It should not be down to me to have to modify my alarm that was working perfectly fine for many years before this change was made by VM. Thanks but I do feel a bit frustrated by this situation. 

[smf4122]

oh and that modification also means that the service that then rings you if your alarm goes off will ring your mobile AND CHARGE YOU A FORTUNE FOR THE PRIVILEGE! If they don't get an answer on the landline they will call our mobiles and the charge in the past has been about £8 for a 45 second phone call. Are VM prepared to compensate us for that? I think not. On this occasion though, the alarm wasn't activated but the panel still keeps periodically bleeping bc the landline is disconnected which means I have to keep getting up and putting my code in to stop it which at 2 in the morning seriously affects my health. 

[goslow]

Can't argue with the point(s) you make ref. having to foot the bill for any changes and the fact that the phone line is less-functional than it was before.

Unfortunately, the present requirements on how these phone-lines-via-router were allowed to work were rubber-stamped by OFCOM before they were implemented after a long consultation period.

During that time, the OFCOM requirements were reduced down to just some very basic requirements regarding 999 access during power cuts. No great consideration was given to what else customers might have connected to their lines and how those might need to work in the future.

Can't help you with the specifics of alternative alarm setup/costs. Someone else on the forum may be able to advise on that if they use an alarm-via-mobile connection or your security company maybe for cheaper options on how to go about it.

Does the phone line work normally for regular telephone use as/when/if you want to use it (so as to be clear that a phone line fault is not involved anywhere in the mix here)?

[smf4122]

Yes it's fine the rest of the time so no it's not about a fault. As you say it is just this problem that this maintenance causes the phone line to cut out and I guess that maintenance has to be done in the middle of the night for supposedly minimal disruption. Maybe they need to look into ways of bypassing the phone line when the maintenance is on the tv service? Is it possible for them to not disconnect the modem, merely restart it? 

[goslow]

I would doubt VM will be making any changes to its regular maintenance procedures.

Have you spoken to your alarm company about the issue to see if they have any kind of workaround for the alarm beeping at night if the landline goes down (some kind of mute function for warning beeps for error codes during night time hours etc. or something similar)?

[smf4122]

that's an interesting idea, I am waiting for them to call me back so I can discuss options and reset the system. I'm just annoyed that VM seem to feel no responsibility to its thousands of customers who must be in the same boat but hey that's society these days I guess. Thanks for the suggestion though. 

[smf4122]

It also occurs to me that silencing the alarm would indeed solve my problem but would somewhat negate the entire purpose of the alarm? I kinda need to know if it's not working so silencing it would not alert me to a problem.